On 7/12/2011 ben wiessner wrote:>My mate Rob was climbing Forever Young at Koalasquatsy Wall, Grampians,>when he had a rather nasty experience. He found placing the 4th draw on>lead to be rather taxing, so he took a jump a little way above the 3rd>bolt. In the process of falling the top biner of the 3rd draw snapped.>So he fell a fair way larger than expected, was flipped upside-down, ending>up with his head a foot off the deck.

lucky to be alive by the sounds of this near miss.
I know why the biner broke, its because the climb was bolted in a dangerous manner.
1000 apologies would not have brought your friend back from the dead, or been able to erase the memory of him spearing in and being killed in front of you from your mind.

Its one thing to be such a prolific bolter as to rob the coming generations of any climbs left untouched by this compulsive new router,

But the point is grid bolting areas or even just bolting poxy climbs so that every possible climb on that particular wall has been climbed graded and named by you is egotistical and selfish, what will the future generations have left for them after NM has searched and destroyed all potential new climbs for the ones who come after us ?
its a finite resource, and if its all gone then there will be no more new climbs.

Now its become obvious that the bolts are dangerous as well because he didn't do it safely.

how is it possible for the person responsible for SAFER CLIFFS VICTORIA to screw up so badly, oh and its not the first time is it Neil Monteith ?

there are many others out there who I've talked to who feel the same way I do, but are unwilling to voice there opinion of NM because this will mean they suffer instant loss of access or disbarring to a particular section of the forum (safer cliffs victoria) by NM, as it seems that he apparently owns this section as well as being a moderator.

no doubt this will be my last post due to having an opinion, but have a think about this...
if enough people die in a national park due to dangerous & illegal bolting then climbing will be banned for good.

Hey sport, anyone can make a mistake. And it is a bad attitude of mind for climbers to assume that because something is ring bolted it is safe. There are plenty of experienced climbers around who would have spotted that bolt as problematic and backed off or used a sling on it.

On 9/12/2011 jammin wrote:>But the point is grid bolting areas or even just bolting poxy climbs so>that every possible climb on that particular wall has been climbed graded>and named by you is egotistical and selfish, what will the future generations>have left for them after NM has searched and destroyed all potential new>climbs for the ones who come after us ?>its a finite resource, and if its all gone then there will be no more>new climbs.

I've been gone from the Grampians for almost four years - lots of opportunity for someone else to do some new routes. Anyone can go out and do new routes. I'm not stopping them.

>Now its become obvious that the bolts are dangerous as well because he>didn't do it safely.

>how is it possible for the person responsible for SAFER CLIFFS VICTORIA>to screw up so badly, oh and its not the first time is it Neil Monteith>?

Yes, I can readily admit to making mistakes over the years - bu the difference is as soon as I know something is dangerous I immediately let others know about it. The sad thing is that no-one else is willing to correct these unknown problems that have reared up now that I don't live in Victoria anymore. I notified this forum and local climbers 3 years ago to potential problem clip-and-go anchors at Red Rocks, Invisible Fist and on this route. No one has done anything about it. Instead I spent half of my recent one week holiday fixing some of them. It seems 99.99% of climbers are happy to use my anchors but are unwilling to even spend one minute of their precious time fixing something (for example the clip and go anchor on Forever Young can be disabled in 30 seconds with a pair of pliers).

>there are many others out there who I've talked to who feel the same way>I do, but are unwilling to voice there opinion of NM because this will>mean they suffer instant loss of access or disbarring to a particular section>of the forum (safer cliffs victoria) by NM, as it seems that he apparently>owns this section as well as being a moderator.

I have barred two people in total who are not blatant spammers in 9 years of modding Chockstone. If you think that is over zealous you are clearly an anarchist. I invite anyone who has a problem to get in contact with me directly. I'm very easy to find. And i'm not scary.

>no doubt this will be my last post due to having an opinion, but have>a think about this...

No way. I'd love to hear your views. Keep typing please. The longer the better. Please expand your viewpoints - i'm all ears. In fact get your mates to write as well. The more viewpoints the better. I'd prefer to hear their actual opinions rather than the hypothetical fact that these people exist.

>if enough people die in a national park due to dangerous & illegal bolting>then climbing will be banned for good.

So I guess that means you will never clip a bolt in the Grampians ever again hey mate? If I see you clip even one then im sorry that's being pretty hypocritical.

On 9/12/2011 tnd wrote:>And it is a bad attitude of mind>for climbers to assume that because something is ring bolted it is safe.

Agreed! This experience has alerted me to the fact that I had made the above assumption. It's up to the climber to assess the pro, and draw conclusions about whether it's safe or not, regardless of whether it's sport or trad, Forever Young or Auto-da-fear.

So once again, thanks for bolting the route Neil. I think it's a mighty fine route and I am glad you bolted it :)

It actually seems to me that is was bolted okay..the fact the gear failed at the third bolt and the climber still pulled up tells me it was actually a good bolting job in general...it always worries me when bolters intentionally run out stuff that means if a bolt fails at any point it means a grounder...accidents happen...any bolt or gear could fail at anytime but the beauty of sport climbing is you can account for that in your bolt placements....

....no matter how well or badly something is bolted however its up to the user to decide acceptable risk...its a part of being a climber.

On 9/12/2011 jammin wrote:
"Its one thing to be such a prolific bolter as to rob the coming generations of any climbs left untouched by this compulsive new router, (think the Ruined castle,Sentinel cave,Guernica block,Espanol pinnacle,Red rocks tower & pinnacle,Ravine,Cut Lunch, Bad moon rising,etc etc I could go on)..."
"...what will the future generations have left for them after NM has searched and destroyed all potential new climbs for the ones who come after us? its a finite resource, and if its all gone then there will be no more new climbs."

I'm having trouble getting my head around this argument. Is this point of view isolated to NM, or do you feel the same way about anyone who puts up a high volume of new routes? When is "the right time" to do a new route, which generation is the chosen one? Is it a sport vs. trad argument, in that the above-mentioned areas shouldn't have been bolted because later generations were being robbed of the trad FA? I've climbed at most of those areas (as I'm sure you have too, or at least seen them) and I'd question whether the majority of the routes there would ever be a reasonable trad lead (hence the bolting). Or is it that these bold future generations would perhaps place less bolts, and it's the number that are on these climbs that you find objectionable?

I'm not criticising your position, Jammin, it's just that I don't understand it, and to start / continue an honest dialogue about an issue which you clearly are passionate about, your position needs to be clearer.

[Disclaimer - I've enjoyed the majority of NM's sport routes that I've done, and I've been appreciative of the hard work and effort he has put into developing sport climbing areas.]

Whoever jammin is, they clearly have some agenda against Neil which involves the same unfounded rant over and over no matter what the topic is. How about sticking to topic and providing pertinent comments.

ALthough I can see how a tight U bolt could cause rotation and break a biner, I do have to wonder like someone above whether there was some underlying fault in the biner to make it break as it did.

Bundy- McGurkensquirter from memory is because the bolt is above an ironstone band so your biner gets cross loaded rather than the bolt per se. lots of examples like that around from bolters who dont test the lay of the biner against the rock when considering bolt placement.

On 9/12/2011 vwills wrote:>Whoever jammin is, they clearly have some agenda against Neil which involves>the same unfounded rant over and over no matter what the topic is. How>about sticking to topic and providing pertinent comments. >>ALthough I can see how a tight U bolt could cause rotation and break a>biner, I do have to wonder like someone above whether there was some underlying>fault in the biner to make it break as it did. >>Bundy- McGurkensquirter from memory is because the bolt is above an ironstone>band so your biner gets cross loaded rather than the bolt per se. lots>of examples like that around from bolters who dont test the lay of the>biner against the rock when considering bolt placement.

go easy against bommer. He still believes in fairies. Its really hard maintaining a belief in fairies in this modern world - I think he should be commended.

On 9/12/2011 vwills wrote:>Bundy- McGurkensquirter from memory is because the bolt is above an ironstone>band so your biner gets cross loaded rather than the bolt per se. lots>of examples like that around from bolters who dont test the lay of the>biner against the rock when considering bolt placement.

We all get it wrong sometimes, and hopefully someone fixes it. But not in my home (edit start) state it seems.

On 8/12/2011 mikllaw wrote:>I think the "V" slot formed between the rock and the lower part of the>eye jambs the biner. The biner can easily be jambed away from its major>load axis, then you've lost 2/3rds of the strength.

Mike,
Even at 2/3 strength, a fall like that shouldn't have produced anywhere near enough load to break it, shouldn't it ?

On 9/12/2011 jammin wrote:>Now its become obvious that the bolts are dangerous as well because he>didn't do it safely.>>how is it possible for the person responsible for SAFER CLIFFS VICTORIA>to screw up so badly, oh and its not the first time is it Neil Monteith ?>
and mikllaw wrote:>We all get it wrong sometimes, and hopefully someone fixes it.

could be wrong but sport climbers clip and go. that is what sport climbing is.
others p[osted put a draw on it, but sport climbers dont carry binerless draws do they? mentality is dont think but climb because it is safe, because it bolted and others done it already therefor safe ?
im not sure this is good enough. either is bolted and safe or leave it to trad and whatever risk goes with that.

nobody should have to fix mistakes becouse is easier to simply go climb another route but how would you know the third bolt is unsafe till you gewt there?
new age climbing gym mentality says bot every 2 meteres but what if bolt is unsafe.
this is big problem not accepted by bolter i think.